Arms control begins with his legs

Before finding a new life in running, there were times Julius Arile found himself running for his life.

Arile grew up in a remote area of West Pokot in Northern Kenya, where the business of raising and rustling cattle can be exceedingly dangerous. Arile was just 15 when he first picked up a gun, a part of life as a pastoralist in the region, with the raids sometimes taking him and his AK-47 into neighboring Uganda.

"The business is to get cattle, that is the only income," Arile said. "Cattle is everything."

One of those raids about seven years ago changed Arile’s perspective and mission, when he chose a path away from the violence and toward a goal of joining the country’s elite runners.

"One time when we were raiding, when we were fighting, one of my friends was shot down beside me," Arile said. "From that day I decided to leave guns."

Arile, 30, has since moved to Iten, a high-elevation town where many of Kenya’s top distance runners train, and found a purpose and platform in the sport.

He’s now a voice for arms control and embarked on the longest leg of his journey this week in making the 38-hour trip from Kenya to Hawaii to run in the 40th Honolulu Marathon on Sunday.

Arile spent four years running in shorter road races before turning his focus to marathons two years ago. He ran a personal best of 2 hours, 12 minutes, 13 seconds in a sixth-place finish in the Prague Marathon in May. An invitation to the New York City Marathon beckons as a career goal as Arile continues to develop running 26.2 miles.

"He has the talent to achieve that," said agent Zane Branson, who represents five of the professional runners entered in Sunday’s race, including Arile. "He just needs a few breakthrough races and get the opportunity to be on the starting line in a race like New York."

"I know now my talent is to run," Arile said, "not to fight and do those things."

Arile said the bigger prize money available was part of the attraction to moving up to marathons. But the races also provide a means of delivering his message of peace. He has twice spoken at the United Nations, most recently in July, and met with then-secretary general Kofi Annan in 2008.

"We have to tell the government to stop allowing the guns to get into the hands of the civilians. We need these guns to be controlled," Arile said. "We tell governments to not allow the manufacturers to spread guns. … It is very hard, it is not easy."

Along with taking his message to government officials, Arile has also taken a personal approach to reducing some of the violence he grew up around by convincing others to follow him into running.

"I go back and tell my friends to leave, that this is not good," Arile said. "I took some of them to run with me. I have six of them leaving guns and started training with me."

After Sunday’s race, Arile will have a chance to perhaps spark interest in others with his experiences in his first trip to Hawaii, which he completed late Tuesday night. The journey began with a 7-hour bus ride to Nairobi followed by flights to London and Los Angeles on the way to Honolulu.

He’ll be part of a fast elite men’s field that includes countryman Wilson Kipsang, considered the world’s top marathoner, and two-time defending champion Nicholas Chelimo. Regardless of where he finishes, making the trip will give him something to take back to Kenya.

"After the race on Sunday I’ll go back to Kenya and tell them about Honolulu," Arile said.

"If my body responds I hope to win the race and that will become the opening for others to come."